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By Paul Lecker
MarshfieldAreaSports.com
MERRILL – In a battle of two evenly-matched teams, it was Merrill that was able to pull ahead in each of the last three games and beat Marshfield 3-1 in a WIAA Division 1 regional championship match Saturday night at Merrill High School.
The Tigers won the first game 26-24, but Merrill rallied to win the final three games, 25-22, 25-20, 25-19 to reach the sectional. The Bluejays will take on Wausau East, a 3-2 winner over rival Wausau West, in a sectional semifinal Thursday at Antigo. The sectional final is Oct. 30 at East.
The two teams split a pair of matches during the Wisconsin Valley Conference season and the regional final was just as competitive. Neither team led by more than four points at any time, except for a short stretch in the middle of the third game, and at the end of the third and fourth games.
“I kept looking at the score and it would be 12-12 and it felt like it should be 20-20,” Marshfield coach Dawn Sadowska said.
Marshfield rallied from an 18-14 deficit to take a 20-18 lead in a topsy-turvy first game. Marshfield gained a sideout and Sarah Cherney served four straight points, including two aces.
Merrill rallied to take a 22-20 lead, only to see Marshfield come back again. The Tigers staved off a game point and won the last three, two on kills by Tiffany Stargardt, and the final one on an ace by Sarah Wolff to win 26-24.
The Bluejays led 12-8 in the second game before Marshfield reeled off eight points in a row, seven on the serve of Stargardt, a sophomore who led the Tigers’ offense with 14 kills.
Marshfield led 20-18 late but only managed one more kill point and Merrill took advantage of a number of errors. A kill by Andi English gave the Bluejays a 25-22 win to even the match.
Merrill used a 10-2 run midway through the third game to take an 19-13 lead and led 20-16 before Marshfield scored four points in a row to tie it. However, the Bluejays earned a sideout and a pair of kills by Sam Hojan gave Merrill a 25-20 win and control of the match.
Merrill closed out the fourth game, and the match, by scoring eight of the final 10 points.
“Once we got into the third and fourth game, especially the third game, we struggled with our serve receive,” Sadowska said. “That’s been kind of a problem for us all year long. When you can’t make your passes off a serve receive, you’re going to have trouble running our offense.
“When we were able to run our offense, we were fine. That’s normal. When you can’t serve receive, you aren’t going to be able to do anything else.”
Jess Sabey had 13 kills and Renee Sladek added 11 for the Bluejays. Linsday Krueger had 15 assists.
Cherney and Courtney Bauer each added nine kills, and Kim Johnson had seven for the Tigers. Setter Sarah Wolff had 33 assists.
Marshfield loses four seniors, including Chereny, Johnson, Wolff and Kelsey Coffren, but returns two freshmen – Bauer and libero Darian Molter, who led the Tigers with 18 digs Saturday – and three sophomores – Stargardt, Mikala Sebastian and Melissa May – that played key roles for the Tigers this season.
“I expected us, in the beginning, to not be so good because we were starting so many younger kids, but they all stepped up and played really well,” Sadowska said. “They pulled together and the seniors really stepped it up the last three or four matches. They showed leadership from what they were doing in practice and on the court, and the younger kids followed.
“Obviously, we would have liked to have gone farther with this group, the seniors have worked really hard, but we do have a bunch of kids coming back and we’re really excited about that.”